Sporran restoration

[o j kirby]

Hello,

I have a WW1 Seaforth sporranin need of some work. The leather cantle (the top section with the badge) is in a bit of a state. The leather has been sticky at some stage, and although now dry, has a lot of hair stuck to it.

I am wondering if anyone can advise me on...

Removing the stuck hair...and...restoring the dry leather.

Any good advise is welcome!

Many thanks

Owain.

[old-ted]

Hi Owain, I'm not sure about removing the hair thats stuck to your sporran, I guess it would depend on the glue or whatever it was that caused it to stick. I have had a lot of old leather bits over the years and have used lanolin to good effect. It's a natural product available in tubes from your local pharmacy/chemist. It will feed the leather and soften it but needs time to soak in. Having said that I would wait to see if any sporran experts offer their specialist advice.

Good luck with it and do post a photo before and after.

Regards

John

[MBrockway]

Owain,

I was going to suggest Neatsfoot Oil, which I use very successfully on leather bike saddles, but doing a bit of checking reveals you should definitely NOT use Neatsfoot Oil on historic articles!

You should also avoid Saddle Soap apparently!

This looks like a good alternative: British Museum Leather Dressing and it's rich in lanolin.

Mink Oil ! also came up after some basic digging.

Can't vouch for either from personal experience though - all our family sporrans are very carefully looked after and none date from earlier than the 1930s!

Cheers,

Mark